Trade in the Confederación Granadina according to the Chorographic
Commission 1850-1856
Vallecilla Gordillo, Jaime and Botero, María Mercedes
Centro de Estudios Regionales, Cafeteros y Empresariales -CRECE
July 2010
Online at https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/69037/
MPRA Paper No. 69037, posted 27 Jan 2016 12:35 UTC
Trade in the Confederación Granadina according to the Chorographic Commission
1850-1856
1Abstract
This paper analyzes differents aspects of internal trade taking place during the mid 19th century throughout the several regions of Colombia. This is precisely the priod when the agro-export economy began. It is based on Data and economic information found in several differents publications of La Comisión Corográfica (the work of Italian geographer Agustin Codazzi, who explored, characterized and drew maps of Colombia´s provinces between 1850 and 1859). This paper shows that regional flows of goods (mainly cattle and textiles) were frequent in certain areas; especially in the eastern Andean provinces of Colombia.
Key words: Regional History; 19th Century; agriculture; regional trade; Colombia;
Chorografic Commission.
JEL: N560, N960
La faz social de nuestros mercados semanales y su influjo en la unidad y nacionalidad granadinas, son temas que ciertamente merecen la estudiosa atención del patriota.
-Agustín Codazzi, Geografía física y política de la Confederación Granadina
Introduction
Like other Latin American countries, Colombia experienced an export development model from the mid-nineteenth century. Indeed, the economic dynamics depended largely on the external sector growth. The products Colombia exported included tobacco, Peruvian bark, precious metals, indigo, leathers, rubber and straw hats, among others. (Ocampo 1984).
Colombian historiography has been enriched in recent decades with studies of its export’s performance in the XIX century, particularly with the work of José Antonio Ocampo (1984). The author examines with historical series “carefully refined” trends and phases of foreign trade in the XIX century, and the ups and downs of the main export products. Also, several researchers have been interested in the history of several of these products, such as coffee (Palacios 1983) and others have addressed it from a regional perspective (Dominguez and Gomez 1990, Bejarano and Pulido 1986, Alarcón and Arias 1987, Vallecilla 2002 and Botero 2007), among others.
1By María Mercedes Botero (mariamerce@une.net.co) and Jaime Vallecilla, Researcher at CRECE (jaime.vallecilla@gmail.com). The authors thank the unvaluable support of Gustavo Ochoa –Researcher at CRECE– in the elaboración of the map included in the article, as well as the critical comments of two anonymous reviewers.
Therefore, today we know more about the development experienced by foreign trade in Colombia after the mid-nineteenth century. However, the literature is not so abundant as to the characteristics and evolution suffered by domestic trade after the new free-trade policies were approved in 1846. Little is known about the volume and value of trade between the towns of a region and of a region with other parts of the territory; the formation of local and regional markets linking together different areas.
Perhaps trade movements most often occurred strictly between local markets.
However, there is evidence that some specific products such as the case of tabacco, cocoa, gold, foreign goods, among others, would reach distant markets as the Chorographic expedition confirmed. Precisely the purpose of this article is to begin identifing internal trade, hence flows and economic interrelations between regions as well as some regional, economic characteristics at the time when export development began.
This job requires huge effort and a patient work in order to find the various national sources extract data and carefully reconstruct missing or not visible figures, as well as trying to elucidate the problems presented by these statistics. This article is based on the initial results of this work.
The text is divided into three sections: The first part examines the Chorographic Commission as a documentary source. The second section holds a brief description of some of the characteristics (size, population) of Colombia in the mid-nineteenth century and the main features of regional economies based on their agricultural production, mining and manufacturing and the stock of cattle (bovine, porcine, sheep, etc.) of each State and Province. The regional economic interrelations are the subject of the third section.
1 . The Chorographic Comission as a documentary source
One of the arguments that began to prevail among the political elite of the country in the mid-nineteenth century –as a way of achieving economic growth– was the greater integration with the global economy through export of goods and capital imports (Bulmer– Thomas 1999).
In the words of Florentino González, we must “offer Europe the raw materials it needs and open the doors to their manufactures in order to facilitate exchanges and the profit they bring.”“Wealth” said Gonzalez “is obtained only by producing things that can be sold at a profit as our tobacco, our sugars, our indigo, coffee, [....] gold, silver and copper from our mines that are taken to the huge and rich market in Europe” (González 1984). “Domestic trade would be stimulated to the extent that the exports of agricultural and mining products would be expedited.” (Restrepo and Restrepo 1986)
The idea of progress in all fields was contained by the new economic perspective advocated by liberals who conducted the Reforms of Nineteenh Half Century “But progress meant improvement in material conditions. To achieve this it was essential to open roads, compose waterways, measure and divide the barren lands, attract foreign immigrants and enliven trade. None of this was possible without knowing the country in all its details and without maps that would bring guide” (Sánchez 1999).
Once the Congress of Granada passed the law authorizing a Chorographic Commission, Florentino González wrote: “it is necessary that a new nation where all is undoubtedly bad set, starts providing this knowledge to improve social conditions (....) I speak of a statistic made by intelligent people who understand the reality and enumeration of all that exists, that give an idea of the riches and natural resources of the country and of the sources from which may emanate in the future equal or greater”. (Quoted in Restrepo Restrepo 1986, 1181).
Between January 1850 and February 1859, the territory of New Granada was subjected for the first time to a systematic geographical study. According to the study of two researchers, “the Chorographic Commission was the first scientific enterprise nationwide.” (Restrepo and Restrepo 1986). For nine years the Chorographic Commission headed by the military geographer Agustín Codazzi, visited most of the regions inhabited in the country recording their geographical and topographical features and their natural resources, industries and social conditions (Sánchez 1999).2
Population and livestock records found in the work of the Chorographic Commission disaggregated by provinces, districts and villages of the country allowed us to reconstruct with figures, some economic characteristics of the different regions in the mid- nineteenth century. But historians can count the number of inhabitants of a district or village, the number of pigs, horses, mules or cattle. But the problem is whether the statistics used are reliable indicators of what the researcher wants to investigate. Therefore, the question is to know where those figures presented by Codazzi came from.
A thorough review of the methods of fieldwork and the huge variety of sources used by Codazzi are found in the Book of Efrain Sánchez Cabra Gobierno y Geografía. Agustín Codazzi y la Comisión Corográfica de la Nueva Granada (Sánchez 1999, chapter 7).
According to this historian, Codazzi had at his disposal numerous materials supplied among others by the government of New Granada, which “provided Codazzi with statistics, census and other official information on physical aspects and political economy of the provinces. It also ordered that he be given access to provincial, cantonal and parochial archives and commanded the authorities to offer all the information requested by the Chorographic Commission” (Sánchez 1999, 466).
2 The Italian military engineer Giovanni Battista Agostino Codazzi (Lugo, 1793) studied at the prestigious Scuola Pratica di Artiglieria Teorico in Pavia. After his arrival in Venezuela he was responsible for elaborating the maps of Lake Maracaibo, of the borders of Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador and an Atlas of Venezuela that was awarded in France. By request of the British government he conducted an inspection for a future canal in Panama whose layout is the same as proposed by Codazzi. He died during the work of the Chorographic Commission in Espíritu Santo (now Codazzi, Department of Cesar) in February 1859.
However, Codazzi also used non-traditional sources of information as explained by the researcher mentioned above. According to Codazzi´s writting “the guides who accompany me constantly in all directions, which know with accuracy the farms and ranches are the first to give news of cattle and beasts (horses).” And further ahead he clarifies “when you get to the parish you already have an idea of what can exist; in the parish we reunite with the priest, if any, the mayor and two or three of the main and most educated of the village as with the guides from all fields and paths {....} With these, then, we calculate what there may be in each neighborhood or parish party, making them see the need to know, not the rich people of the country but the richness of it by an approach that is closer to the truth more by default than by excess”.
The excellent book of Sánchez Cabra, which is based on a thorough review of literature and sources, leaves no doubt about Codazzi´s effort to present with most accuracy his observations in the economic field.
2. The regional economies
In this part, a description of the economic relations between regions is made based primarily on qualitative information, just as the Chorographic Commission recorded in its numerous volumes published in 1856, reprinted by the Bank of the Republic in 1959 and recently by the University Nacional de Colombia and other universities.
The first section attempts to show briefly some of the characteristics (size, population) of Colombia in the mid-nineteenth century. By way of context; The second section shows the main features of regional economies based on their agricultural, manufacturing and mining productions as well as a description of the stock of cattle (bovine, porcine, sheep, etc.) of each State and Province.
The third section analizes the regional economic interrelations. In addition to data tabulations with the texts of the commission, from which emerges a varied painting of the regions of Colombia, comments that come from various authors have been added and some comparisons are made in order to evaluate the results obtained.
Area and territorial division
Mid-nineteenth century Colombia stretched over an area of 1.33 million km2 including Panamá and 1.26 million km2 if this territory is excluded. That first figure is given by the end of that century by some authors such as Pereira (1883) and Vergara (1901) and are based on official estimates.3
Table 1. Colombia: Provinces and States, 1852 and 1863
State Provinces
Antioquia Antioquia, Medellín and Córdoba
3 These figures, which vary according to the source used, indicate a reduction of about 125,000 km2 if Panamá is excluded regarding the current area of Colombia (1,141,478 km2) or 200,000 km2 if included. A comparison between the mapping of the second half of the XIX century and early XX century and todays mapping illustrates this point; see Blanco (1992), among others.
Bolívar Cartagena, Sabanilla and Mompox (west side of the Magdalena River)
Boyacá Casanare, Tundama, Tunja and Vélez (includes
Chiquinquirá and Moniquirá and excludes the canton of Vélez)
Cauca Barbacoas, Buenaventura, Cauca, Chocó, Pasto, Popayán and Túquerres and Territory of Caquetá
Cundinamarca Bogotá (excluded districts that are part of Tolima)
Magdalena Santa Marta, Riohacha and Mompox (east of the Magdalena River except various districts that are added to Santander) Panamá Azuero, Chiriquí, Panamá and Veraguas
Santander Ocaña, Pamplona, Santander, Socorro, Soto and Vélez Tolima Mariquita and Neiva
Source: Compilation of the authors based on Gómez (1970) and Pombo and Guerra (1986).
In 1852 Colombia was named “Republic of New Granada” and was divided into thirty-one Provinces and one Territory (Caquetá). In 1863 these provinces and territory were grouped into nine states: Antioquia, Bolívar, Boyacá, Cauca, Cundinamarca, Magdalena, Panamá, Santander and Tolima. A rough correspondence between them is shown in Table 1.4
The state of Cauca protruded by its size: comprised half the country´s area (about 660,000 km2), followed by Cundinamarca with 16%; other states have somewhat similar shares ranging from 7% in Boyacá and 3.5% in Tolima (Chart 1).
The huge territorial extension of Cauca -a giant arc from Urabá to Vaupés- was very unevenly populated, as its population and economic activities were concentrated in the Andean region (Valle, Cauca and Nariño), with low and very low population densities in the Pacific coastal area, and especially in the Amazon periphery.
Chart 1. Colombia: Distribution of the State´s area, km2 in the XIX century
Source: Authors calculations based on Pereira (1883), Velasco (1901) and IGAC (1980).
4 The sequence of territorial entities from greater to lower area is: state-province-canton-district / city / village.
Estado %
Total 100,0%
Cauca 50,0%
Cundinamarca 15,7%
Boyacá 6,9%
Panamá 5,7%
Magdalena 5,0%
Bolívar 4,9%
Antioquia 4,4%
Santander 3,9%
Tolima 3,5%
A similar situation occurred in Cundinamarca, with population and economic activities concentrated in the Andean region (plateau and, to a lesser extent, slopes). In general, as Rueda states (1989, 359-360): “The Amazon, the Orinoco, the plains of the Pacific coast as well as the interandean valleys remained virtually uninhabited by mid- nighteenth century.”
Population
Mid-nineteenth century Colombia´s population was 2.1 million (2.2 million including Panamá), according to the census of 1851, with a growth rate of 1.8% annual average between 1835 and 1851 (1.9% between 1843 and 1851). This rate was higher than that recorded between 1820 and 1850 in European countries such as France (0.5%), Germany (1%) or the United Kingdom (0.9%), but lower than other countries of recent European colonization, such as Argentina (2.4%) or the United States (2.9%).5
This population is unevenly distributed among States and within them as well. The most populous States were Boyacá, Santander, Cauca and Cundinamarca, followed by Antioquia and Tolima as shown by Figure 1 and Chart 2.
If we consider the course of the Magdalena River as a dividing line of the national territory, so the region located on the right bank is “east” and on the left bank of the Magdalena is “West”, in 1851 the population was distributed in equal parts between the two regions.6
Figure 1
5 For countries different from Colombia, author's calculations are based on Maddison (1997). Lower rates of European countries are partly explained by migration to the New World and Australasia.
6 Todays Cauca and Nariño are considered part of “the West”.
Source: Calculations based on Gómez (1970).
Regarding the rate of regional population growth, Antioquia and Cauca are the States with the highest rates for the period 1843/1851: 3.1% and 2.3% respectively and 2.7% in both States for the period 1835/1851.
With a slower pace, but above the national average is Santander at a rate of 2% in both periods, while the Caribbean region shows the lowest rates: Bolívar with 0.9% in both periods and Magdalena with 0.6 and 1%. Other States record a similar rate to that of the country between 1843 and 1851, like Boyacá, Tolima and Panamá and lower like Cundinamarca.
As foreign immigration to Colombia was almost null during the mentioned periods and well national migration, the population increase was mainly due to natural increase (birth minus deaths). In the regions, demographic changes originated in their different rates of natural increase and internal net migration, such as the migration of people from Antioquia within their territories and to Cauca and Tolima: the “Antioquia colonization” which had begun in the late XVIII and early XIX century, populating territory of Antioquia and current Caldas, Quindío, Risaralda, the north part of Tolima and the slopes of the mountains in Valle (Vallecilla 2002).
Chart 2. Colombia: Population distribution by State and density according to the 1851(*) census
Total: 2,105,622 2,243,730 with Panamá
Source: Gómez (1970) and authers calculations based on Pereira (1883) and IGAC (1980).
(*): In 1851 States didn´t exist yet; the Provinces were grouped in them according to Table 1.
On the other hand, Chart 2 also shows the population density (inhabitants per km2) of each State and as can be seen the highest densities correspond to the “Andean” States:
Santander, Tolima, Boyacá and Antioquia in that order, well above the national average (1.7 inhabitants / km2). The densities of the Caribbean region are similar to the national average (Panamá) or less (Magdalena) and relatively high in Bolívar (3.1 inhabitants / km2).
In other Latin American countries, Colombia´s density around 1850 was similar to that of Chile with 1.9 and Peru with 1.6 inhabitants / km2; lower in Argentina and Brazil (0.4 and 0.8, respectively) and much higher in Mexico (3.9).7
The low densities of Cauca and Cundinamarca are explained by the concentration of the population in the Andean region of these two States, as mentioned before. Indeed, according to the geography of Perez (1883), about 90% of the territory of Cauca and 89%
of Cundinamarca was “vacant”, ie, “not settled”. If these areas are excluded from the density calculation, a preliminary estimate results in 4 inhabitants / km2 in the case of Cauca and 13 for Cundinamarca (plateaus and slopes).
Most of the population was rural and there were no large cities; even the cities
“barely went from being large villages” and other urban agglomeration “were simply cores of residence of rural landowners, to which a handful of artisans and officials was added”
(Melo 1979). The mayor “Cities” were: Bogotá (30,000 inhabitants), Socorro (15,000), Medellín (14,000), Cali (12,000), Cartagena (10,000), etc.8 However, as mentioned by Zambrano and Bernard (1993, 89), “the most populous cities were found in the Eastern Mountain Range, in the Pamplona – Bogotá, where the most active network of the New Granada was found.” This distribution is consistent with the figures in Chart 2 (percentage of population and state´s density).
7 The area figures used in estimating density of the countries refer to the current limits, which are not exactly the same as c. 1850.
8 Figures are rounded and sourced from the Chorographic Commission itself and Melo (1979). In the Commission, Bogotá has 60,000 inhabitants.
Estado % Densidad
(hab./km2) Total 100,0% 1,7
Boyacá 16,9% 4,1 Santander 16,1% 6,9 Cauca 14,4% 0,5 Cundinamarca 14,1% 1,5 Antioquia 10,8% 4,1 Tolima 9,3% 4,5 Bolívar 9,2% 3,1 Panamá 6,2% 1,8 Magdalena 3,0% 1,0
Finally, it should be noted that the 1851 census showed a very similar proportion of men and women: 49% for the first group and 51% for the second; similar proportions are in the States.
Media and transportation
This introductory section can not end without pointing out some characteristics of the infrastructure of communication and transportation in the mid-nineteenth century in Colombia. First of all, as has been recognized since colonial times, the rough topography of the Andean zone constitutes a formidable obstacle to the construction and maintenance of adequate means of communication, which makes it difficult to transport goods and people between the Andean region and between this region and the coasts of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
Until the mid-nineteenth century, the main routes of land communication were the horse trails and waterways that connected the inland with the sea, among them the rivers Magdalena, Cauca and Meta and some of its tributaries.
Later, during the second half of the XIX century railroads were built and regular vapor transport was initiated by the Magdalena River. Therefore, when the Chorographic Commission carried out its work, the only railroad in construction -and the first in Colombia´s territory- was Panama´s (begun in 1850 and completed in 1855), so there are two stages in infrastructure and transportation throughout the XIX century that can be distinguished, whose outline is shown in diagram 1.
In both stages, the ground transportation was the mule or other animals (horses, oxen) and even people (“silleros”) and the infrastructure was the horse trail and the river transport the champagnes, bongos and boats primarily, but steamships were in sporadic and non-scheduled services in the first half of the XIX century (Safford 2010).
In the second stage, thanks to the rise of tabacco in the Ambalema area (Alto Magdalena), the steamship service in the Magdalena is regularized. According to Safford (2010, chart 6), five steamers sailed in 1852 in the Magdalena River and ten in 1864.
Diagram 1. Colombia: Outline of communication routes and transportation, first half XIX century
Source: Authors elaboration based on diverse documentation.
Nor there existed (and did not exist well into the XX century) what might be called a “system”, i.e., an integration of the means of transport of the different regions, but horse trails did exist that linked the towns and the rainy seasons had them more difficult and inaccessible.
In summary, the diagram highlights that the main and almost sole means for transporting goods and people in the mountainous interior of the country was the mule; in some areas, oxen for heavy load was used. For the import and export cargo, the Magdalena River and some tributaries provided a way to transport goods and people on bongos and champagnes until mid-century, when the service of steamships entered.
Given these characteristics, it is not surprising the abundance of stories where the difficulties of the journeys of foreign and domestic travelers through Colombia´s territories in the XIX century are narrated. In particular, the journeys that required travelling through the mountain ranges in transverse direction were difficult, for example between Popayán and Santa Fé, for which there were two routes: the passage of Quindío and the Alto of Guanacas, between Popayán and La Plata, whose path was covered with “the bones and skeletons of these animals [mules and horses]” as an anonymous British traveler narrates in 1820 (Colombia [1822] 1974, I, 195-196).
Production
Perhaps the most important aspect of the compilation held by Codazzi and the Chorographic Commission from an economic point of view, was his collection of data from the local and regional production and, perhaps most importantly, flows between and within regions. Unfortunately, Codazzi failed to cover the States of Bolívar and Magdalena, so we lack direct information from them.9
This part describes and analyzes the agricultural and non-agricultural production (mining and manufacturing) and the herd of the different species in each Province and State.
Agriculture and forestry
The main crops of the country by mid-nineteenth century were not very different from those in the colonial period, although by the effect of liberal reforms an expansion of the agricultural frontier and the initiation or expansion of crops such as tabacco, indigo, coffee and logging activities such as Peruvian bark and rubber had begun.
From the text and data of the Chorographic Commission, Chart 3 presents the twenty-two major agricultural products ordered by the number of provinces which recorded its cultivation, of a total of twenty-four (not including Bolívar and Magdalena, as already mentioned).
According to the point of view above, the main products are: corn, cassava, sugarcane, beans, bananas and potatoes, all grown in more than half of the twenty-four considered Provinces and on two or more climate zones, except the potatoes.
Two of the products in Chart 3 are not food or drink: tabacco and anise, which were cultivated in the fifth part of the provinces; also, most of the products were only for domestic consumption; except for tabacco, cocoa, coffee, anise and derivatives of the sugarcane (panela and sugar), which were both consumed domestically and exported.
Export products come from various regions of the country. For example, tabacco was mainly produced and exported from the Magdalena Valley where the major producing districts were, among others, Ambalema. Carmen de Bolívar also participated in the tobacco boom in the sixties. During the Colombian domination of the world market of Peruvian bark, the exports came from the Hoya del Magdalena and Santander, Cauca and the Nariño mountain range, Huila and western Cundinamarca.
Chart 3
9 As mentioned earlier, Codazzi died in Espíritu-Santo (Magdalena) during the work of the commission (1859).
H: hot M: medium and C: cold
Coffee began to be cultivated as a commercial plantation in Norte de Santander where it moved to Santander and later on to Cundinamarca.
In the case of rubber, it began to be exploited in the influence zone of Cartagena.
Afterwards, the border of exploitation moved to the jungles of the Pacific coast and then to Barranquilla and Caquetá. At the end of the century, the exploitation of rubber extended to the Amazon (Ocampo 1984).
In turn, Antioquia experienced an auriferous cycle that positioned it as the main producer and exporter of precious metals of the country (Ocampo 1984) until the 1880s when the coffee cultivation began to expand in the south of its territory.10
10 In the late eighties also appear on the list of products exported from Antioquia: rubber, tagua and straw hats. Around 1865-1870 reduced amounts of indigo were exported (Botero 1890).
Food and drinks were also imported at the time (about 7-8% of total imports);
according to the weight of the imported products, the main products were wheat flour, rice, sugar, butter and corn for food and wine for drinks (Ocampo 1984).
Almost all the provinces recorded maize crops; in fact, Pasto is the only one where its cultivation does not exist (it only registers anise). Corn is one of the staple foods in the diet of Colombia and its ability to be grown in all climatic zones (from 200 to over 3,000 meters above sea level) contributes to its ubiquity. From corn, chicha is also obtained, an alcoholic beverage widely consumed in the period.
At the end of the XIX century, but surely valid for the mid of that century, Vergara and Velasco wrote,
And since corn is the vegetable that covers more altitude zones, from the warm, which pays up to four harvests a year, to the tundra, where it matures with difficulty in twelve months, therefore it´s a staple food for general nutrition in the form of bollos, arepas, conqué, mazamorra, pesada, clarito y chicha (Vergara y Velasco 1901, 742).
The following four products: cassava, sugarcane, beans and bananas are all grown in warm and medium climatic zones (between 200 and 1700 m.a.s.l). Cassava, like corn, was widespread in almost all the considered territory (79% of the total) and was also food to the aboriginal population from pre-Colombian times.
Sugarcane, grown in 71% of the provinces, was very important because of its agro- industry derivatives: panela, sugar, honey and aguardiente (or the less spirited “guarapo”).
According to Patiño (2002) until the mid-nineteenth century it´s technology had not changed much compared to the one introduced by the Spaniards to the XVI century. Sugar was rather an export item, although to Venezuela (Maracaibo and Táchira) and the exports of panela were recorded from Santander, as well as shipments to Antioquia (Medellín Province?).
Beans and bananas have also been part of the staple diet of the population. Beans can be grown in the lowlands (vine) and in medium and cold climatic zones (bush). Banana is native from the Southeast Asia and North of Australia, but was introduced to América from África.
As for upland crops (cold) potatoes, wheat and barley stand out. Potatoes grown in the highlands of the States of Santander, Boyacá, Cundinamarca and Antioquia and in the provinces of Túquerres (Cauca) and Neiva (Tolima), is also part of the pre-Colombian diet.
Probably most of its cultivation and production volume was located in the cundinoboyacense highlands and in the Nariño highlands, as happens today.11
11 The closest statistic to 1851 for the whole country is 1915 and by then Cundinamarca, Boyacá and Nariño together produced more than 70% of the total (Kalmanovitz, López and Romero 1999, Table 4.10).
Wheat and barley were grown in 46% and 38% of the provinces, respectively, and the main production sites were the same of the potatoes. Another important tuber was arracacha, grown in nearly half of the provinces.
Among the half-height crops include anise and coffee. Coffee still marginal as export product, but in the following decades with increasing importance.
The most important crops of warm lands are rice, cocoa and tabacco. The first was cultivated in a little more than half of the Provinces and almost all States; very probably in Bolívar and Magdalena. The cocoa was the favorite hot beverage during the XIX century in Colombia and along with tabacco they´re included in exports since the early decades of the XIX century, although with low proportions of the total (not more than 5%). As it is known, from the middle of the nineteenth century tabacco recorded a “boom” that had considerable effects on the economy of the country and the cultivating regions: Ambalema (Tolima), Girón (Santander), Palmira (Cauca) and Carmen (Bolívar). The development of tabacco and other tradable goods “required a process of internal migration of considerable magnitude, by which the temperate zones of the slopes of the mountain ranges and some valleys were occupied” as Melo points out (1979, 141).
Another product of warm land was cotton, which was also exported in the first half of the XIX century. The textile factories of this fiber were very important in Santander and Pasto.
Among the forest products, the extraction of Peruvian bark and tagua were recorded, the first one in the Province of Santander and the second in Ocaña. However, in the flow of interprovincial goods, besides Santander, Ocaña and Vélez in the State of Santander, other provinces are listed as places of origin such as Neiva in Tolima and Buenaventura and Popayán in Cauca. Echandía and Sandoval (1986) indicate that the first wave of extraction, which occurred between 1849 and 1852, had as predominant area Cundinamarca and Cauca. Meanwhile, Ocampo (1984), states that between 1850 and 1882 the world market for periuvian bark was dominated by those of Colombia.
Although because of the reasons mentioned above we do not have the agricultural goods grown in the vast area of Bolívar and Magdalena, we used other sources ie, the descriptions of the usual coastal diet, in order to get an idea of its agricultural and livestock production. According to Posada (1998), the travelers in the region, although different depending on the time and place.
(…) rarely fails to mention bananas, rice, cassava, cheese, beef and fish as the main food (...) A soup made of mixed vegetables and meat was the common dish among the lower classes, 'sancocho' (...) In addition to fish, rice was also another staple food in the coastal diet. In general, the cultivation of rice and also maize, cassava and bananas were carried out in small plots that also included pastures and fruit (Posada 1998, 76).
Therefore we can say that, with the explicable exception of potatoes, wheat and barley and other of highlands, the main goods listed in Chart 3 were also grown in Bolívar and Magdalena.
Mining and manufacturing
Gold was the main mining product since colonial times and the main export commodity between 1834 and 1850 (over 70% of the value of exports between 1834 and 1845), place that in later periods was occupied by tabacco and coffee. Gold production was concentrated in Antioquia and Cauca; in the XIX century Antioquia displaced Cauca as leading producer in Colombia (Botero 2007 and Brew 1977).
Gold mining worked primarily with slave labor, was concentrated in Cauca, bearing in mind that the 1851 census recorded only 0.7% of the total population as slaves, while in Cauca this percentage reached 3.3%, that´s nearly five times the national average.
Among the non-metallic minerals, salt was also very important as food and as livestock inputs. The Commission mentions numerous minerals, but most all without exploitation or with minimum extractions, except for coal in Amagá and iron in Pacho, where the famous foundry of the same name was organized.
The industrial production (manufacturing) consists basically of goods resulting from the processing of agricultural and livestock commodities (food, beverages, hats of vegetable fibers, leather and furniture and –agroindustry) and of metals and minerals as some simple agricultural tools and utensils of domestic use (locería).
From wool and cotton, there was a developed indigenous tradition of making garments (ponchos, blankets, covers and canvas), especially in Boyacá and Santander. The furniture and crafts of Pasto also stood out.
Herd of cattle
The Chorographic Commission conducted a kind of inventory of the existing livestock in the country and whatever the degree of error in their uprising, it has left a valuable repository of information. According to the figures in Chart 4, the herd of cattle reached 3.1 million, of which 1.3 million corresponded to beef cattle, a figure significantly higher than the 900,000 recorded by Melo (1991, 169), whose source is the same as ours.
Chart 4. Confederation Granadina: Livestock by species, by State, 1851/1856
Source:Authors calculations based on the Chorographic Comission (2002, 2003, 2004).
Cundinamarca, with 22%, Boyacá, Cauca and Tolima with 18%, record the highest shares of the total herd; Santander follows with 16% and Antioquia con 8%.
The beef cattle was the species with the highest number of heads (42% of total -see Chart 5) and the states of Tolima (23%), Cauca (22%), Cundinamarca (21%) and Boyacá (17%) had the largest herds, which together accounted for over 80% of the total.
Magdalena´s figures refer to a part of the territory that was part of the Province of Ocaña and is not representative of the total.
The absence of data of Bolívar, Magdalena and Panama underestimates the results in Chart 4 if we consider that in the 1882 -incomplete- enumeration these states recorded 69,000, 18,000 and 77,000 heads, respectively. The figures of Vergara and Velasco (1901) are much higher in 1890 for the same territories: 340,000, 100,000 and 250,000. And even if the data is of forty or fifty years later, according to Kalmanovitz (1979 and 2009) the cattle herd appears to have increased slowly, just 1-1.2% annual average between 1800 and 1850 and then increased faster between this year and 1899 with a rate of 2.5% because of the introduction of new technologies such as barbed wire, type of pasture and genetic improvement (see Patiño 2002).
McGreevy estimates (1982) indicate a steady increase in the XIX century, with a rate of 2.5% per year, which does not seem real, but rightly points out the problems of undercount in 1882 (or 1880).
Chart 5 breaks down the figures in Chart 4 according to the provinces of the Confederation of Granada for the total herd and beef cattle. The province with the largest number of heads is Bogotá, which includes not only the territory of Cundinamarca but San Martín (part of the current Meta) and part of Tolima. It´s followed by the provinces of Mariquita, Cauca, Tunja and Neiva.
In Bogotá, the main districts were San Martín (today in Meta) and Soacha; in Mariquita the main cattle districts were Guamo and Guayabal and Unión in Neiva. In Cauca the main districts were Palmira, Florida and Bugalagrande. In Tunja they were Ramiriquí and Guateque.
State Total Cattle Hogs Sheeps Horses Goats Mules Donkeys
Total 3,088,256 1,294,190 612,842 526,016 333,689 164,340 141,275 15,904 Antioquia 237,518 111,756 87,182 1,410 22,487 1,306 13,208 169 Boyacá 569,676 213,860 64,260 194,515 58,233 20,410 15,226 3,172 Cundinamarca 677,853 268,870 86,260 196,503 56,468 29,190 39,155 1,407 Tolima 542,997 296,450 79,120 30,105 67,592 43,586 21,538 4,606 Cauca 557,425 280,301 121,865 41,038 83,276 12,630 17,166 1,149 Santander 486,912 122,953 167,155 55,445 44,383 57,018 34,857 5,101 Magdalena 15,875 n.a. 7,000 7,000 1,250 200 125 300
Chart 5. Confederation Granadina: Total Livestock and Cattle, by State and Province, 1851 - 1856
Source: Authors calculations based on the Chorographic Comission (1958, 2002, 2003 and 2004)
The participation of the total herd of cattle (fourth column) could indicate to some extent the type of property and the predominant prominence in the provinces and districts.
Thus, in the provinces of Casanare, Buenaventura (that included Cali and Roldanillo), Mariquita, Cauca and Neiva, the percentage of beef was greater than 50%, while in the provinces of Santander, this percentage is not more than 36% in any of them. 12 Taking into account the type of economic structure of Santander (“farmer economy”), the above figures would be consistent with this hypothesis.
12 Barbacoas is not taken into account (82% in beef cattle) because of its reduced number.
State / Province Total Cattle %
Total 3,088,256 1,294,190 41.9%
Antioquia 237,518 111,756 47.1%
Antioquia 43,703 20,656 47.3%
Córdoba 114,484 55,500 48.5%
Medellín 79,331 35,600 44.9%
Boyacá 569,676 213,860 37.5%
Tundama 179,436 42,220 23.5%
Tunja 239,598 55,728 23.3%
Vélez 35,457 11,462 32.3%
Casanare 115,185 104,450 90.7%
Cundinamarca 677,853 268,870 39.7%
Bogotá 677,853 268,870 39.7%
Cauca 557,425 280,301 50.3%
Barbacoas 611 500 81.8%
Buenaventura 54,960 37,770 68.7%
Cauca 253,334 142,280 56.2%
Chocó 20,974 4,035 19.2%
Popayán 194,596 86,316 44.4%
Túquerres 32,950 9,400 28.5%
Magdalena 15,875 - 0.0%
Ocaña 15,875 - 0.0%
Santander 486,912 122,953 25.3%
Ocaña 48,081 1,230 2.6%
Pamplona 23,962 8,660 36.1%
Santander 49,525 10,450 21.1%
Socorro 212,581 68,807 32.4%
Soto 103,676 19,201 18.5%
Vélez 49,087 14,605 29.8%
Tolima 542,997 296,450 54.6%
Bogotá 2,606 1,000 38.4%
Mariquita 318,539 181,600 57.0%
Neiva 221,852 113,850 51.3%
Also, there would be a relation between the type of exploitation and consumption of livestock; according to Melo (1991, 169): “While the livestock was, above all, a business of wealthy entrepreneurs and offered its product to urban markets, the production of pork seems to have been in good farmers hands, with a more popular consumption”.
Porks, with more than 600,000 animals, followed in importance the beef cattle, half of which in Santander and Cauca (Chart 4). The sheep cattle was concentrated in Boyacá and Cundinamarca. In Boyacá, in the provinces of Tunja (canton of Tunja) and Tundama (canton of Sogamoso). In the other important livestock: horses and mules, the two largest by number were Cauca with 25% and Cundinamarca with 28%, respectively.
A simple model that tries to establish the relation between population and herd of livestock (bovine, porcine, horses, etc.) of the 89 cantons of the Confederation of New Granada shows a positive relation between the two variables, as shown in Figure 2.13 Figure 2. Confederation Granadina: Population vs. Herd of cattle, by cantons, 1851- 1856
Source:Authors calculations based on the Chorographic Comission.
The median of the population is 17.763 and 31.259 for cattle. The maximum of the first is 69.045 in Vélez (Santander) and the second 201.220 (Ambalema).
The codes that appear to the left of the 89 cantons correspond to the departments and the Capital District of the current political-administrative division and we were careful
13 The double logarithmic Version of the model is LOG (CATTLE) = 3.518 + 0.685 * LOG (POP). The adjusted R2 is 0.40 and heteroskedasticity correction was performed.
0 40,000 80,000 120,000 160,000 200,000 240,000
0 20,000 40,000 60,000 80,000 11-Bog 15-Chi15-Coc
15-Gar 15-Gua
15-Lei 15-Mir 15-Mon 15-Mor
15-Ram 15-Soa
15-Sog
15-SRV 15-Tun
17-Sup 19-Alm 19-Cal
19-Mic
19-Pop 19-San
19-Sil 20-Chi
25-Chi
25-Cho 25-Fac25-Fus 25-Gac 25-Gua
25-Mes
25-Pue
25-SA
25-SJR 25-SR
25-Toc
25-Zip 27-Atr 27-SJ 41-Car 41-Gua
41-Nei
41-VV 50-Mes 50-Vil52-Bar
52-Tuq 54-Oca
54-Pam 54-Ros54-Sal
54-SanJ
5-Ama 5-Ant 5-Mari
5-Med 5-Rio 5-Sal
5-Sop
5-SRO 68-Bar 68-Buc
68-Cha 68-Gir
68-Oib 68-Pie
68-SG
68-Soc
68-Vel
68-Zap
73-Amb
73-Cala
73-Chi 73-Fus
73-Mar
73-Mira 73-Nat
73-Pur 76-Ansn
76-Bug 76-Cal 76-Car
76-Pal
76-Rol 76-Tor 76-Tul 81-Ara
81-Mel85-Cis 85-Gut
85-Tag
POP
CATTLE
of distributing the population and herd of the cantons that today are distributed between two or more departments. For example, the canton of Mesa Carupa includes municipal territories of Cundinamarca and Meta, Ocaña of Cesar and Norte de Santander, etc.
The cantons of Ambalema, San Antonio (Cundinamarca), Tunja, Chía, Sogamoso, Palmira and Mesa of Carupa (Cundinamarca) record the largest herds, while Bogotá, Vélez (the share of Santander) and Chipasaque the largest number of inhabitants.
3. Interregional and intraregional Trade
The “archipelagos economy”
The expression of Nieto Arteta is known to describe the weak or null integration of the regions of Colombia before the XX century: “During the colonial era in Colombia there wasn´t a real national economy. There was an archipelago economy (...) There is a set of closed and partial economies (...) the viceregal economy is an unbounded economy” (1975 Nieto Arteta, 15).
Undoubtedly, the regions of Colombia –especially some– were poorly integrated economically in the mid-nineteenth century, but the term “archipelago economy” may be exaggerated and misleading to describe the relative economic isolation of Colombia, as despite the difficulties of transport and communication routes, there was a flow of goods between regions as well as external relations. Indeed, merchants and traders, crossed in various directions fragments of the territory. Some, like the carriers transporting cocoa traveled long distances from the province of Neiva or of Cauca to Antioquia and Bogotá.
And the movement of live animals connected several provinces of Santander with each other, like Casanare with Bogotá. Others didn´t move that far, between local markets.
The recognition of a slow but gradual movement of people and goods through some parts of the national territory, as well as the record of fairs and local markets have come to us through the writings and memories of people who lived in the XIX century. For example Aquileo Parra, former President of Colombia from 1876 to 1878, relates how he started in trade. In the town of Vélez, along with his brother he sold foreign goods brought from Bogotá. And he himself took charge in accompanying the long and winding road of Carare and then by the Magdalena river, the shipments of bocadillos (snacks) and blankets made in the populations of the old province of Tunja that were sold in the Magangue fair (Parra 1912).
The researcher Frank Safford (2003) shows the circuits where the imported goods by the house of Francisco Vargas of Bogotá were distributed. Usually, their clients were in the Eastern Mountain Range, with Bucaramanga in the far north, in the lowlands to the west and southwest of Cundinamarca and in the High Magdalena –the current Tolima and Huila.
The records of local and regional markets have also come to us in the work of the Chorographic Commission. The importance of those markets and domestic traffic was
noted by Codazzi. For example, in his analysis of the Province of Vélez in 1851, he commented:
The people from Vélez were content with the internal traffic traveling through the weekly markets to change with each other diverse goods that each one carries. These small fairs not only help to meet the material needs gathering in a market the productions from different places and climates, but also tend to draw useful knowledge and friendship relations between the inhabitants of the province, carving links whose moral consequences are invaluable for a country cut in all directions by high mountains that divide and separate people as could the large distances. The social face of our weekly markets and its influence on unity and Granada nacionalities are issues that certainly deserve the studious attention of the patriot (Chorographic Commission 2004, 57).
Of course, a way of assessing the market integration is to review the prices of goods in different places at different times, but the respective figures are very scarce for the time of the Commission and only Bogotá and Cartagena can be compared, city and province, Cartagena without production information with little information of flows.14
Interprovincial trade flows
One of the tasks of the Chorographic Commission was to conduct a survey of data from the production and trade of the major items of each province and canton of the Confederation of Granada. After a thorough review of documentation of the Commission, 114 products that were traded between the provinces of the Confederation and abroad (Venezuela, Ecuador, Perú and unidentified countries) were identified. The 114 products were added in 24 groups (see Annex 1) to facilitate the presentation of results.
Then we proceeded to tabulate the flows mentioned by the Chorographic Commission in each province, including the flows from and destined abroad (undefined) and to Venezuela, Ecuador and Peru, from which resulted a matrix origin-destination whose detailed version consists of 462 rows and 32 columns. This is a purely qualitative matrix of flows: the name of the goods traded between Provinces and States but not its volume, since it´s not specified in the text, although in some cases it includes the value of total trade.15 Map 1. Confederation Granadina: Flow of live animals and animal products between provinces, c. 1856
14 The available information comes from Arrubla and Urrutia (1970) and it shows that in 1850 there were large differences in these two cities in the prices of rice, beans and sugar but not in the cocoa.
15 This matrix is not included in the Annex given its size, but an electronic version can be requested to the authors.
Source:Authors elaboration based on the Chorographic Comission and Restrepo (1979).
In Annex 1 a chart that corresponds to a shortened version of the above matrix and shows the exchanges of the 24 groups between provinces and abroad, is presented. The chart shows the product groups entering all provinces and abroad from these same territories. The first column records the total trade of the products included in these groups in the mentioned local entities.
For example, the value 972 means that in total, 114 products from 24 groups were exchanged 972 times. In the second row the products of the live animals and animal products group (which are cattle, poultry and eggs) appears in 145 exchanges (come and go) and is the largest of all. It is followed by textiles (97), other agricultural products (82), sugar (56) and footwear and leather products (52).
It´s likely that the same product registers more than one exchange, which can occur if it´s redispatched from one province to another. For example, from Ocaña horses are sent to Santander and also a movement of horses appears from Santander to Táchira (Venezuela), but it´s not possible to know if they are the same horses.
Given that the group of live animals and animal products is the largest in exchange, Map 1 was designed based on a map based on Restrepo (1979), which records the flows of this group and illustrates quite well the interregional trade of the Confederation of Granada in the mid-nineteenth century.16
It is worth mentioning that cattle constitutes almost all products within this group and within cattle the highest proportion is bovine (32%) and, to a lower proportion, mules (18%), horses (17%) and pigs (17%); the exchange of other livestock (sheep, goats and sheep) is very small. That is, that despite the correlation between cattle and population, before mentioned, there was a commercial flow of cattle (mainly bovine, transport animals and porcine).
From Map 1 of the table in Annex 1 and from the referred matrix (but not included in the article) some important comments can be made.
The regions of the east and center-east, ie the provinces of Santander, Boyacá and Cundinamarca, Bogotá essentially seem very interrelated; the same can be said of the three provinces of Antioquia. In Cauca, the interrelation is more intense between Buenaventura, Cauca and Popayán, on one hand and Pasto, Popayán and Túquerres on the other. In short, the current Departments of Valle, Cauca and Nariño (Andes)
Bogotá, Santander, Socorro, Chocó, Medellín and Popayán are the provinces with the highest number of exchanges; none of them are contiguous, although the first three are close and all are located in the central-eastern Andean Zone
The different textile articles of clothing, the second group of products with the highest exchange, originate mainly in Santander (all provinces) and Boyacá (provinces of Tunja, Tundama and Vélez) and an extensive exchange between the two regions is recorded; in smaller numbers, Cauca is also origin of these items although several of them are imported genres
Surprisingly, Chocó (Pacific Coast), so isolated from the rest of the country by land, registers such a high number of exchanges. This is because mining (precious metals) requires inputs to carry out this activity (lead, gunpowder, chemicals, etc.) and goods for the employed population (see on this subject Botero 2007 and Vallecilla 2002). Indeed, this province receives food and
16 The political-administrative division of the map does not correspond fully to those noted in Table 1. For example, the Province of García Rovira doesn´t appear on the Commission and Cundinamarca appears divided into four provinces and the territory of San Martin. On the other hand, the arrows map don´t pretend to replicate the effective routes taken by the flow of goods, but only indicate their direction.
beverages, cattle and clothing not only from adjacent provinces (Buenaventura, Cauca and Antioquia), but from far away places like Cartagena, probably by sea-river and Ecuador by sea 17
An intense flow of goods in border areas (like today) is noted: Santander and Casanare (Arauca) and Venezuela (Maracaibo, Táchira and Mérida) and vice versa, and in the south between Cauca (Pasto, Túquerres and Buenaventura) and Ecuador; Peru to a lesser extent. The same between Buenaventura, Barbacoas and Panama, by sea
The flows between the States of Bolívar and Magdalena with the interior, especially Santander and Chocó are weak, although some of this is due to the lack of coverage of the Commission in these States, as mentioned. There are also records of exports of some provinces to unspecified foreign countries.
Vélez (Santander): Peruvian bark and fine woods (unspecified); Neiva (Tolima):
Peruvian bark and hats and Mariquita (Tolima): tabacco; Medellín: gold and silver.
When compared in some provinces the produced goods with those who leave for other provinces and abroad, these last goods don´t match with those produced, indicating a larger interregional trade that goes beyond the neighbors.18
In short, although the lack of quantitative data like exchanged volumes and values and prices in different regions prevents deny the lack of integration of regional markets -the
“archipelago economy”- it can be concluded that the interregional flows of goods especially cattle and textiles, were quite dense between certain regions of Colombia, in a degree that perhaps had not been previously revealed.
In this regard, a review of the integration of the foreign exchange market between Bogotá and Medellín, and concerning the "archipelago economy," Meisel concludes that
“(...) the integration of markets can not be seen as something categorically, that exists or doesn´t exist. Rather, integration is a spectrum in which there are some products, such as perishable, in the lower range and other like gold, which transportation cost is minimum to it´s value, that are in the upper range” (Meisel 1994, 172)
17 It´s also surprising to find movement of butter and cheese in the province of Túquerres to Barbacoas.
18 Of course, it also may be due to the underrecording of some produced goods.
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